A girl who has invented a new character for Harry Potter could win the chance to meet the boy wizard's creator, JK Rowling, in Edinburgh.

Kelly Teall, 16, a pupil at Cooper School in Bicester, believes her fictional character Lucia di Borghes, an outspoken Italian, should be featured in the Harry Potter novels.

Kelly Teall She entered a competition to invent a new character, and was among 10 entrants shortlisted who are in with a chance to meet Ms Rowling at the launch of the sixth book in the series at Edinburgh Castle.

She said: "Lucia di Borghes is a fiesty Italian, who is the girlfriend of Charlie Weasley.

"Everybody else had a main part, but Charlie Weasley wasn't featured much, so him having a girlfriend would be a way of bringing him in.

"Lucia's smart and doesn't like being told no."

Miss Teall said she was a huge Harry Potter fan and had read all the books, with the fifth -- Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, being her favourite. Kelly's mother, Paula Reeves, said: "I was quite gobsmacked actually. Out of the thousands of people that entered she was one of 10 that got picked. I'm very proud.

"She loves reading and she's always drawing, designing and writing stories. She's going to study art and design at college in September."

Her father Duncan Teall, a warehouse supervisor, said: "We are very proud of Kelly, she's done really well. She's very imaginative on the design front, she's very creative and clever."

Ms Rowling will unveil her sixth book about the schoolboy wizard at Edinburgh Castle on July 16.

If Miss Teall's character wins she will attend the launch and at one minute past the witching hour listen to Ms Rowling reading from Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, the latest in the series.

About 70 winners of various media competitions will travel up the Scottish capital's historic Royal Mile in horse-drawn carriages to the Castle Esplanade for the event, which will be broadcast live worldwide on TV and radio.

They will return to the oak-beamed Great Hall of the castle later on the Saturday for a Hogwarts-style banquet.

On the Sunday, the winners will then have the opportunity to be cub reporters and question Rowling, in what the author has promised will be the book's only news conference, before taking home a signed copy.

Bookstores around the country will hold midnight book launches.